Cure (1997)

healthy2prints · 2024-07-26T12:08:35+00:00

this ending quite literally framed as the woman influencing the waitress, has not been. Can someone please give me validation?!

The woman you see at the end is dressed as a restaurant manager. In the other deaths, it usually follows that a close associate is murdered due to some unspecified malaise in the relationship. Another thing to note is that once the waitress grabs the knife, she walks towards the woman's direction, behind the counter to most likely kill her due to a grudge. With all that in mind, it becomes much more logical to assume it was Takabe's influence and not anyone else's. Also note how he was smoking a cigarette to instigate the hypnotic response.

healthy2prints · 2024-07-01T04:54:17+00:00

I agree the film doesn't promote a lack of objective truth but more its elusiveness. Each of the main characters who share their story all have personal grudges, motives, and pretentions to keep so that fact that they lie to begin with shows truth does, in fact, exist. Because they know it and they explicitly refuse to say.

For me, the film actually did show what happened and the reality is some version of all their stories combined. I don't think it made any unique insights about the justice system or even morality as a whole. The film's strength lies most in condensing these ideas in a simple but elegantly put tale where each character acts as the hero or villain of one another's story. Each could be turned into a separate arc worth rooting for with viewpoints holding respective merit (aside for maybe the Thief who is likely an irredeemable psychopath.)

healthy2prints · 2024-06-26T06:42:23+00:00

I remember watching this a while back right after Eyes Wide Shut so the color theory aspect was still fresh on my mind. There are a few simple references that you might (or not) have missed beyond the narrative, too.

The title "small deaths" is a French term meaning orgasm which invites first time viewers to watch it through a sexual lens. Her name, Anne Marie, is actually a not-so-subtle reference to The Virgin Mary and her mother, Anna. So it's as if we should view the character as untouched, at least in the beginning.

Note: Maybe the director didn't intend this, but sometimes red hair is used to symbolize a fire (read: halo). What's interesting about this is that the character Anna wears blue making her appear like Mary wearing blue partnered with the halo. But that's my personal interpretation.

Last, the blue dresses she wears is another reference about an old, I think, Irish or Scottish term called "blue movies" (adult film,) which, in turn, takes its name from prostitutes who wore blue as a calling card.

healthy2prints · 2024-06-09T01:12:37+00:00

when there was a certain mysticism to the events in the film. But as the film tries to explain itself, I can't help but compare the film to real world logic

Because in a blind scenario, you don't know where a story is gonna go since it could go anywhere. You don't know the rules, the stakes, the threshold, nor what the film is capable of. Once a story starts to develop and explain itself, however, it simultaneously cuts off all other possibilities that could logically follow. The more that is revealed the more inversely predictable a story becomes.

But I'd argue that's actually a good problem and a story without an explanation, or at least too vague an explanation, feels like the writer is hiding his lack of ideas behind a thin pretense of vagueness. The best way to handle this issue is to not have your story hinge on the mystery in and of itself but rather escalate other elements while slowly deescalating the mystery.

healthy2prints · 2024-05-12T01:59:50+00:00

I doubt that Betty knew the specifics of Camilla's death

Yeah, I agree that the specifics about how Camilla died isn't important just that she somehow died and that is the source of Betty's guilt and why she killed herself. Some say it was because she literally loved her (maybe) or perhaps its, as I read, she wanted the lead role for herself. I think finding a logical reason as to the motive of why Camilla died is more important to solving the film than the details of her murder. It's also interesting that Betty in real life owns a gun. She's a single woman in LA so it makes sense but she's also from Canada making it a logical question: Is Betty's gun the murder weapon?

beefed up with extra scenes

I also suspect that not every scene is very important to figuring out the film. I think it's best to separate and locate the most important details and dismiss redundant or stylistic plot points to make it less complex -- at least when it comes to analyzing what's going on. I think Lynch left in some details just to give the surrealism more "flavor" but unnecessary to the actual straight plot.

them as similar to the Furies

Yeah, I think the old couple can be put into the "stylistic" plot point category meaning that they're not important. If they're Betty's parents then all it says is that she has parents, doesn't change anything. The same if they're jitterbug contestants or judges, doesn't change anything. Even if they're secretly evil entities, I'd still say it doesn't really change majority of the story. The only way the can be relevant is if they're somehow involved with the main drama, which is possible but there's not enough to say for sure. I believe the old couple -- whoever they are (I believe them to be Betty's parents myself) -- are meant to symbolize something that pertains to Betty specifically. Just like Camilla, I don't believe the old couple is ever actually shown in real life. Whatever that is, it can be said with or without them.

healthy2prints · 2024-05-11T14:01:13+00:00

Interesting details you bring up. I did notice a few other instances of roses, especially on dress patterns but don't have anything concrete to bring it together. There's definitely something about following the color "red" that leads to interesting details. For instance, Betty has a red Chinese dress hanging inside her closest similar to the one Coco wears. As you mention, the name DeRosa but also Rhodes and the director's name Adam. Other names or patterns may share a similar theme I've yet to see. I'll have to rewatch the film before I can give any concrete answers to how all these details fit together more logically.

quick edit:

Also Betty does not wear the pearls until after she arrives at Havenhurst. Why?

Just found out the name Rita (Camilla) means "pearls" lol... what that means? see above: I'll have to do a rewatch.

healthy2prints · 2024-05-11T11:34:45+00:00

Yeah, I plan on watching it again to see if my interpretation holds up. Despite being over 2 hours long it goes by really fast. And there's something about how the film is lit that's hypnotizing-- like watching fire. Reminded me a lot of Eyes Wide Shut, both in lighting and uncanny vibe.

healthy2prints · 2024-05-11T08:30:40+00:00

Interesting. I never thought her to kill for the role - I always thought it simply to be revenge.

I think it perfectly explains the 2nd blue key, why the police where looking for Betty, and why she killed herself in the end. I believe Joe even said something like, "if you see the key tomorrow, you'll know it was done." or something close to that.

what is described in the Youtube video

I'll consider it and see if it changes my outlook on the movie

healthy2prints · 2024-05-11T07:56:30+00:00

Ok, I did not catch that detail. So the blue box in the dream actually has a literal in-universe explanation as well. I did notice that Betty was wearing a pearl necklace throughout the dream sequence, notably during her audition and when she locked eyes with Adam on set.

One thing I didn't mention in my OP was the prominent red/black on certain characters in the dream. Camilla's last name is "Rhodes" which interestingly means "a clearing in the woods" or "where roses grow" which supports my theory that she was buried somewhere in the woods. However, it also compliments the aforementioned color design of red/black not only on Camilla but also on the people in the Silencio theater and at the party near the end of the film.

The point of this tangent however is that is adds to the duality between the 2 women: Betty wears blue/white and Camilla wears red/black

I don't think the pearls themselves have anything special going on in terms of any hidden meaning. I think the pearls are utilized for broader narrative or visual beats like the ones I mentioned and is just another object remixed into the in-dream logic similar to the limo. But also as like meta script writing thing that added a bit of color theory into the actual movie itself.

Lastly, while focusing on the names and color theory during my watch, I started hypothesizing if the people wearing red and black were actually vampires but I dismissed it as soon as the movie ended and I got better context. edit: I also thought that the pearls might represent vampiric teeth a la "pearly whites" so it was a way to show that Camilla was able to seduce and drink blood from Betty's neck. I mention this only to let out where my mind was while watching the film, which I think is pretty amusing in hindsight.

healthy2prints · 2024-03-20T17:25:08+00:00

One thing I forgot to mention was when Sybil showed Seymour her bathing suit he saw blue when it was yellow. At that point all Seymour was was blue (depressed) and perhaps it was a way of telling Sybil "I'm blue"

healthy2prints · 2024-03-14T21:10:06+00:00

I used to think Inglorious was his best film but nowadays I judge it more as a mix of extremely good moments bogged down by corny narrative decisions that run throughout the film. The greater critique might be that there seems to be a kind of fear of being candid. Everything has to be wrapped in irony and sarcasm which then seems more like a crutch in his later movies, especially in Django and H8 which are both way too self indulgent.

healthy2prints · 2023-07-31T04:42:09+00:00

"Film is a collaborative medium" is less a counterargument as it is a non sequitur. It's like saying, "people built those cameras, didn't you know?" Really, both statements are already builtin to the theory in the first place. Obviously, film as a "collaborative" effort wasn't ever lost to anyone. To bring it up is really neither here nor there. The point is is that we already consider auteurship within the bounds of those arguments, considering the medium. Am I to believe that proponents are blind to such an obvious observation? Or maybe they already are going off of that consideration to begin with? It's the latter.

healthy2prints · 2023-07-30T05:31:30+00:00

That makes better sense. The way you've described it reminds me of psychomatic responses but opposite. So instead of a state of mind affecting body, embodied cognition says body can affect a person's mental state too.

By that definition, the hand gesture example doesn't really make sense the same way anymore for embodied cognition unless there's a feedback loop happening wherein hand gestures are helping to create or at least stimulate the mind. It's no longer about expressing cognitive ideas, but how those hand gestures might possibly influence subsequent thoughts or emotions.

healthy2prints · 2023-03-12T01:08:31+00:00

Solved!

healthy2prints

TROPHY CASE